Chapter 13: Q&A / Discussions

[Dave B.]

That sounds fine with me. Shorak will always be ready to nudge Condign in the right direction, if he should go astray. Not to mention, the rogue likes hiding behind big, tough fighters if trouble rears its ugly head.

[Brian]

I'm afraid some of my current mood is creeping into Condign's behavior. This is a good thing for me. It's allowing me to vent is ways that are safe. The alternative would be rather...messy.

My daughter was carjacked last night. The perpetrator was my ex-wife's step-brother, a man with whom Dana and I have had a positive relationship for many years. She had gone to visit him in Ann Arbor, as she had done on several occasions, but this time he snapped. He pulled the car over by the side of the road, stole her cell phone, her boyfriend's cell, threatened to kill them, forced them out of the car, and then sped off. (My car, by the way. He had asked Dana if he could drive and had no real reason to refuse him.) Her boyfriend managed to flag down a trucker, who called the police to pick them up.

Long story short, the guy was arrested some forty miles from the original incident. My daughter is safe, thank God. So is her boyfriend. And I got my car back.

My head has been filled with bloody visions of what I would do to my ex's step-brother if I ever ran across him again. That little exchange Condign had with the Claw soldier was just what I needed.

I feel a little better now.

Thanks for listening.

[Dave W.]

I was thinking you were playing out a leftover from Dolurrh...

The truth is horrifying. I can't imagine. I have no words... just thank God your daughter and her boyfriend are safe, though it had to be traumatic for her emotionally.

[Jeff]

While I generally wouldn't want the real world driving the game itself (because strangely a world of monsters and violence is still often a nice getaway), I'm cool with it helping however it can in real life.

FYI for the rest of you, if my responses to Brian's out-of-game posts seem terse, I also Google chat with him all the time.

I'm very glad that Dana is okay. That matters foremost.

[Ken]

Holy crap, Brian. What the hell...?

[Darren]

Yikes. Very glad everyone is safe and the asshole is behind bars.

[Dave B.]

Oy! Glad everyone is okay, but again, Oy!

[Joe]

Know that if he ever comes under my purview, he will be dealt with as unpleasantly as I can possible do so. As long as Dana is safe, her boyfriend is unhurt and you have your car back in one piece, that's really about as much as you can ask for in this situation. Also, some late night shenanigans occurring in someone's jail cell wouldn't be wept over. Just sayin'. (I'm more vindictive than Streko...heh...)

[Brian]

Thanks guys for the words of support. I typically don't vent like that but I really needed to let it out, and I knew you guys would understand. You're the best bunch of friends anyone could ask for.

[Darren]

I'll respond to my part later, but what does the elven cloak do?

[Jeff]

She hasn't said, but folklore about those suggests powers of stealth and hiding.

[Ken]

Hey, anybody mind if Belarin buys the confusion stones? They might come in handy. He'll pass on the cloak.

[Dave W.]

May 12, 2016 15:50:50 GMT -4 Ken said:

Hey, anybody mind if Belarin buys the confusion stones? They might come in handy. He'll pass on the cloak.

I don't mind. Does anyone have a sling? Wait until we find out that slings cost 500gp here...

[Darren]

Doesn't bother me, Ken. The cloak is expensive, but Kal wants new toys.

[Jeff]

May 13, 2016 14:37:09 GMT -4 Ken said:

Belarin responds, "Agreed then. Eight hundred for five of the stones, plus the jewelry. I shall go to the bank, gather the funds, and return - not later than this time tomorrow. Thank you."

Ken, actually, the purpose for going to the bank first was to be able to access the party funds. We can process that now if you want, unless for story reasons you'd rather return the next day anyway.

[Ken]

Ah, got it. No, we'll do the transaction now. I'll edit the post.

[Darren]

May 16, 2016 17:28:59 GMT -4 Jeff said:

The old gnome's face sours instantly. "That amount is insulting, young man. I would consider selling it for twenty-two hundred gold pieces, and not a coin less, for a customer who appreciated its value and gave no further offense."


Curious where your player knowledge is coming from. Purchasing magic items, even in the setting-neutral verbiage of the Dungeon Masters Guide, is itself vague and only a basis. The closest you can get is the cost for creating them or reasonably selling them. If you're going off the DMG, don't presume that every magic item in our game matches up perfectly with something in the book.

I admit to looking it up when you first mentioned it because I was curious what it does. The book lists it as an uncommon item. Uncommon items are listed in rarity as being good for characters 1st level or higher and given a value of 101-500 gp. Even allowing for the differences in settings and preferences of the DM, that still seems like a pretty wide disparity.

[Jeff]

Look, if you want to try to do a meta numbers calculation against the game itself it's going to ruin the fun for both of us. I'm not a very by-the-numbers DM.

Uncommon items can be theoretically SOLD for 500 gp, sure. And what I'm saying is don't assume even that much. Uncommon in the core rules D&D can be rare if the DM wants per the setting. Elves are not the same in Eberron, culturally and otherwise. A run-of-the-mill item is just a starting point for me. By far most of the magic items that have cropped up in this game have been my own inventions, with only some borrowing from existing item mechanics at times.

[Jeff]

I'll only add that if you were dealing with a more Deneith-centric item—something that's part of Kal's world—I would have provided some extra insight. As I have with Shorak recently but all of you throughout the campaign.

So if it was dragonshards or even weapons you'd be given a better grasp. Elvish cultural items, not so much. And even with weapons we'd only be talking about basic value of the item and a basic level of enchantment (like +1). After that the value is way more fluctuating. Magic items are harder to quantify in 5E. Deliberately.

[Darren]

It's not my goal to meta-game the system, but we're dealing in a world that doesn't exist and trying tout play reality for people within it, so I'm trying to calibrate myself to understand the value of these items. There still has to be a value of things relative to other things of similar or greater value, power and use, so it's important to understand the scale before making decisions. We've been adventuring, in real time, for a lot of years now and it's taken all that time to acquire the money we have. I think it's important to understand, before potentially spending half of what we've got, what the chances are of ever finding good or affording something "better". So are you implying, not in monetary terms but in value terms, that something listed in the book as rare would potentially, in this world, still cost 10 times more than the cloak in question? Should we expect to some day have to pay 25,000, 50,000, or even 500,000 gp for high powered items (or to find items valued around those amounts)? Again, I just want to calibrate my fictional character's knowledge so that I truly understand the value of what we're talking about here. It's taken...10?... game years to aquire 7000 gp. Should we expect to ever see that kind of sum again? If so, it's easier to make a decision to spend that much.

[Brian]

What you may be missing, Darren, is the ramp up in gold or XP our characters earn as they level up. How much XP did we get for this last adventure? Admittedly it took us some time, but it was a lot. Same with the gold. On the flip side, magical item will (and should) cost proportionally more, as they will be more powerful. It's a balance, like an all-encompassing Force that keeps the gameplay more-or-less even. ?

[Darren]

I get that. Again, this is a calibration for me. So here's a question that I think could be answered in game terms... Kal grew up around money. Would he consider 2500 gp to be a lot of money? Would get expect to see that kind of sum again, easily? What, to him, growing up, was expensive?

[Brian]

My suggestion: make it up. Did his older brothers hog all of the gold, and he now values it more? Did his parents lavish him with gifts, where material things don't matter as much? Maybe he was kidnapped and ransomed at some point, and gold equals freedom and is not easily given. There are no end to the motivational possibilities.

Have fun with it, my friend. You are one creative badass.

[Darren]

Yes, but there is a meta-game practical component to this, too. I'd love to buy expensive things for Kal, but not if it means there won't be an opportunity to do so again for the next 7 years.

I also had a problem with potions in Gauntlet, smart bombs in Galaga, grenades on any modern shooter......

[Jeff]

That's just how I expected a dragonmarked one percenter would talk...

It's perfectly fine to want to understand the money scale in this world. I'm taking more of an issue with where you're challenging it, and when, now that you're facing an expensive magic item (most magic items are expensive). But rather than starting with the DMG, or protesting when you're facing a costly magic item, please start with the Players Handbook. Please read page 143, especially that right-hand column. Attached for your convenience. Please, read that first...

The cost of basic goods and services in Eberron is certainly the same as you see here. It's when you introduce magic that it's different. Certainly Eberron has much more common low-level magic than the assumed D&D world. So things like everburning torches and magelights and coldfire lamps (effectively just objects with a Continual Flame spell cast upon them) are common in big cities. But your average peasant family still uses candles and torches, because they can't afford even the most common of magic items.

That said...

Then read the Lifestyle Expenses section on pages 157 and 158, where it shows you how much it costs to maintain your standard of living. Keep in mind that this stuff is still mostly about the non-adventuring types in the world. I would peg Traveling Kal, and really, the entire party, as wealthy (just because their adventuring has still kept them in enough coin to keep the wealthy lifestyle going)...meaning spending 1 gold piece a day for food and lodging and basic comfort is all that's needed. And as you can see on page 143, a gold piece is about how much a skilled artisan earns in a day in this world. Magewrights (a uniquely Eberron invention) would be a tier above that, and so on.

I'd then say that Homebody Kal, with access to family money back in Sentinel Tower in Karrlakton, would be downright aristocratic according to page 158, wherein spending 10 gp a day on finer things would be normal. Did he have an allowance back in those days? Probably. Leaving home as he did means no regular access to the family money, though.

This, by the way, is why when gold coins are handed about, Rinti is blown away. She lived on copper pieces and suddenly she's thrust into Kal's gold-rich world. Silver is what everyday laborers expect to use. You save up enough silver to buy a few gold coins' worth of stuff, at that level. Urchins are lucky to get copper and often steal to survive.

Adventurers are wealthy, period. So start with that.

So now let's come to magic items. Page 144 and the Selling Treasure section is where you begin. Attached.

When it comes to straightforward items like armor and weapon that do only one thing (be more danger or protect better, simply by having a +1 enchantment), and if you can find a seller (like a House Cannith smithy or like Black Iron), you can expect the most basic of items to range from 100 gp (think ammunition) up to a thousand gp. If other features are involved (like, say, a suit of armor that has a displacer beast-like illusionary trait), you can expect it to cost more. But weapons and armor are easier for Kal to assess. He's a dragonmarked sorcerer raised among military soldiers.

May 16, 2016 19:40:17 GMT -4 Darren said:

I get that. Again, this is a calibration for me. So here's a question that I think could be answered in game terms... Kal grew up around money. Would he consider 2500 gp to be a lot of money? Would get expect to see that kind of sum again, easily? What, to him, growing up, was expensive?

Yes, 2,500 gp is a lot of money indeed. His family could pay for something like that but it would still be a big chunk of change even for them.

May 16, 2016 19:12:38 GMT -4 Darren said:

So are you implying, not in monetary terms but in value terms, that something listed in the book as rare would potentially, in this world, still cost 10 times more than the cloak in question? Should we expect to some day have to pay 25,000, 50,000, or even 500,000 gp for high powered items (or to find items valued around those amounts)? Again, I just want to calibrate my fictional character's knowledge so that I truly understand the value of what we're talking about here. It's taken...10?... game years to aquire 7000 gp. Should we expect to ever see that kind of sum again? If so, it's easier to make a decision to spend that much.

This is very 4E talk to me, and I don't really want to go down that path. In 4E, it was expected and even assumed that at this level, adventurers should have this gp value in gear, etc. It's not going to scale neatly like you want. No, a "rare" category item won't always be 10 times more than what you see in the book. I would lower your expectations.

And as Brian touched on, please also align your expectations with the time in this game. We may have been playing this game for some years now, but only months have passed. Play-by-post, what else can I say? Your gold piece intake is directly related to the story going on, not an imaginary salary you might have basedon real time, you know?

[Jeff]

Another good point of reference is regular, nonmagical plate mail, which costs 1,500.

And here's another thing, in regards to the complaint that the group doesn't have enough money (presumably based on your level): This party has more than forty magic items! Easily half of those are never used. I find a lot of groups hoard their treasure and then forget about it. Even in video games, selling gear so you can get better gear is pretty common as you advance.

Want more gold? Start unloading. Von Ruthvek will buy or sell.

[Darren]

Thanks, Jeff. I wasn't really complaining about how much money we have, I was just trying to figure out what constitutes "a lot". Like I said, it's all about calibration. When we were in college, something that cost $100 was a lot of money. When I started dealing with big numbers every day at work, $100 started to seem cheap. That's what I needed to understand from Kal's perspective.

So now let me ask two questions, one to Jeff and one to the group:

- First, how would the group feel about Kal spending 2 grand?

- Second, Jeff, how does that cloak work in combat terms? When it says that it makes it harder for people to see (in regards to the Wisdom checks for "seeing" a person), does that only apply if a person is actively hiding? How does Stealth work in combat? Can a person attack and then hide?

[Darren]

Also, Kal's sheet still lists the Bracers of Perfect Shot, but I think he gave those to Shorak at some point.

[Brian]

I have no problem with Kal spending the money. Condign certainly didn't hesitate to drop serious coin on a set of armor.

[Ken]

I'm okay with the expenditure. And Darren, the book has a sidebar about hiding.

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